The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation charged a 14-year-old girl today with filing a false report in a 911 hoax that caused authorities in Tennessee and Missouri to issue AMBER Alerts last week.

The teen, from Caruthersville, Mo., has been issued two juvenile petitions after she was accused of calling a Dyer County 911 dispatcher on July 16 and claiming she and her 10-year-old sister had been kidnapped by a man and were being molested in red or burgundy Chevy Suburban, according to a TBI news release.

Tennessee authorities issued an AMBER Alert for “Latrice Watson” after two calls were placed to Dyer County dispatch, the release said. Two more prank calls followed, which were handled by the Pemiscot County, Mo., 911 center.

Most of us at one time have received an e-mail or possibly a text message pleading for us to help find a missing child only to learn later it was a hoax. There are some steps to take before you forward the e-mail especially if it is an AMBER Alert.

Go to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) and click on Active AMBER Alerts orUse the search option to see if the child is reported as missing or

You may want to Google search on the child’s name and Snopes to see if it is a previously reported hoax or

Before you receive the next e-mail or text message, now may be a good time to go to Snopes and search using the keywords “AMBER Alert” for 27 of the most common hoaxes. The stories of Evan Trembley and Ashley Flores give tips on what to look for to determine whether the alert is legitimate

The easiest way to verify the information is accurate is to sign up to receive an alert at a legitimate secondary alert provider. They will send you the alert with updates and a cancellation message once the child is recovered.

There are now 12 states that have implemented Silver Alert systems, which in most cases piggyback the current AMBER Alert system. While legislators applaud their own actions, authorities continue to debate the consequences of activating too many AMBER Alerts.

The officials will wrestle a question with no easy answer: How should they handle situations that don’t meet Amber Alert guidelines but still require the public’s help?

Most people desperate to find a missing child would say that whatever help authorities get is good, whether it meets a guideline or not.

But since the system was created following the 1996 abduction of Amber Hagerman in Texas, authorities have concentrated on protecting its integrity to make sure the public takes the alerts seriously.

Kansas City police spokesman Darin Snapp said the abuse of Amber Alerts recently was discussed at length at a national conference. The alert primarily was designed for stranger abduction but is used more often for missing children or custody disputes. Snapp said officials worry that if the public sees too many Amber Alerts, their effectiveness could be diluted.

“It could lead to abuse of the system and ultimately weaken the system,” Snapp said of alerts that don’t follow the guidelines. Kansas City Star

Why would states push to implement Silver Alerts if they need to cut AMBER Alerts and Sex Offender Registries due to budget constraints?

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — With all state agencies being asked to reduce budgets, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement said it may have to cut two high-profile programs: Amber Alerts and the sex-offender registry notifications.

Those are two of 34 programs that could be eliminated if the state requires the FDLE to cut 10 percent — $18 million — from its budget.

Agency officials said after two previous years of budget reductions, there’s no fat left, so they must consider cutting essential programs.

How often do you think AMBER alerts are issued? How successful are they? You can find some of the answers in the 2007 AMBER ALERT REPORT

Texas issued the most alerts (31) followed by Michigan (29). These states issued none Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Dakota, U.S. Virgin Islands, Vermont, and West Virginia.

Between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2007, 227 AMBER Alert cases were issued in the United States involving 278 children. At the time the AMBER Alert cases were intaked there were 106 FAs, 94 NFAs, 25 LIMs, and 2 ERUs. Seventeen (17) cases were later determined to be hoaxes, and 22 cases were later determined to be unfounded.

Of the 227 AMBER Alerts issued between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2007, 188 cases resulted in a recovery, 48 of which were successfully recovered as a direct result of those respective AMBER Alerts being issued. Six (6) children were recovered deceased, and as of February 20, 2008, when statistics for this report were generated, no AMBER Alerts issued in 2007 remained active.

An AMBER Alert was issued on 10/25/08 for 6 ear-old Cole Puffinburger. Reading this article, “Second suspect described in Cole kidnapping case“, there was this suggestion at the bottom of the page. Problem is when you do that it take you to the main MySpace page where you can search peoples sites for info on Cole Puffinburger. Why doesn’t MySpace put an AMBER Alert icon or tab on the main page if the really want to help find missing children?

For more information on this case, visit MySpace. The popular social networking site has partnered with the Amber Alert System to inform the public of recently abducted children with the possibility of recovering them quicker.